Roommate Wanted  Whistlers Need Not Apply'
by Mrs Doctor Who 11
Summary: Leonard has to deal with a huge emotional blow in his life - except he's not dealing with it. Crap summary but I don't wanna ruin the story shock, just read the first chapter and judge if you like it from that, not this. LENNY, HOWARDETTE, SHAMY.
1. Chapter 1

If you're looking for a happy tale of love and friendship, then don't read on.

For this is a story of love and friendship, but it certainly isn't a happy one.

Most stories start at the beginning.

However, with this story, we're going to start at the end.

Not the end of the story.

The end of a life.

On the 31st of December 2011, at 2:34 in the afternoon, Sheldon Cooper was shot dead.

It is impossible to tell whether he was conscious or in pain when he was taken by ambulance to hospital, but his heart stopped beating at 3:01 pm, just as the ambulance arrived.

Sheldon did not die alone.

When he was shot, he was in a store filled with other people.

Every person in that store saw what happened.

Most wondered why he did what he did.

Only one knew for certain.

Because Sheldon Cooper knew one person in that store.

His best friend, Leonard Hoffstadter.

For Sheldon Cooper died a hero's death.

Saving the life of his friend.

"At my age, do you know how I'm statistically most likely to die? An accident."

It was no accident.

* * *

><p><strong>The requested Sheldon dies story and how Leonard handles it - a touch of genius from LeeRay there :) the credit for idea goes to her and my motivation to her and the others who reviewed asking me to do it, so here's the first chapter! The others will be longer and get to Leonard and eventually, what happened in the store. Please tell me if I'm writing it in the right way. And by the way, I'll reveal who is telling the story (the narrator) at the end. Oooh, interesting mysteries! Review for more :D<strong>

**Mrs DW 11 xx**


	2. Chapter 2

Leonard opened his eyes.

He couldn't work out why it was so hard, why they were so sore, why his stomach was twisted in knots.

And then it all came crashing back to him.

Sheldon being shot, the rush to hospital, stood in the corridor with Howard, Raj, Bernadette and Penny, waiting in his room, speaking to the doctors.

Calling Sheldon's mother to tell her that her son wouldn't be coming home at Thanksgiving.

That he wouldn't be coming home at all.

The machine had been keeping his heart going, his lungs expanding, but it wasn't keeping him alive.

Sheldon Cooper had, in spirit, been dead the minute he hit the floor.

It was the mind of Sheldon that made him alive and that person in the hospital bed wasn't him.

Leonard had wanted to keep the machine on until Sheldon's mother arrived from Texas, but she persuaded him to turn it off before she did.

She said she'd rather see Sheldon peacefully sleeping than hooked up to machines; just an empty shell having air pumped in and out of it.

They had decided between them that Leonard should be the one to do it.

They seemed to come to some unspoken agreement that it would give him peace of mind - relief, if you will, that when it came for his life to end, it was Sheldon Cooper's best friend to let him go.

They thought it would be relief.

But to Leonard?

It felt like murder.

* * *

><p>He climbed slowly out of bed.<p>

He walked into the silent appartment.

He still couldn't bring himself to go into Sheldon's room.

No one goes into Sheldon's room.

Leonard stared at the cereal on top of the fridge, organised in order of fibre content.

He picked one from the middle, poured it into a bowl, added milk and sat with it on the couch before realising he wasn't hungry.

Absentmindedly, he flicked the TV on and browsed the channels.

A reminder for a programme popped up and Leonard pressed OK.

Star Trek played in front of him.

He realised that it had been Star Trek weekend and he and Sheldon had been planning to watch them all.

But that meant...

Leonard looked at the clock.

4:30am.

He and Sheldon had planned on getting up early enough for it, despite Sheldon's complaints that it would mess up his bedtime routine.

Turning off the TV and dumping his bowl, still full, in the sink, Leonard walked back to bed.

He wasn't ready to get up yet.

* * *

><p>Leonard plodded over and sat in the sand pit.<p>

The digger he ad got for his fifth birthday was clutched in his dimpled hand and he began to scoop sand up into it.

He picked a scrap of paper out of his pocket and smoothed out the creases.

On it were measurements for a sandcastle he'd spent TEN WHOLE MINUTES working on last night.

As he built, a young boy wearing a Flash-tshirt walked up and stood, staring at him.

After a little while, Leonard glanced up and shot the boy a shy smile.

"That's my spot." the boy pointed to where Leonard was sat.

Leonard stared at the sand before hesitantly scooching over so the boy could sit down.

"I'm Sheldon Cooper." the boy held out a bony hand, which Leonard shook uncertainly.

"Leonard Hoffstadter." Leonard mumbled.

"That's a cool t-shirt." Leonard put more sand into his digger.

"Thanks. My mother let's me wear it so long as I wear my Jesus vest underneath.

Sheldon lifted his shirt to reveal a vest emblazened with a crucifix.

"My mother says superhero's are un-holy and that the only way they should have powers is if they were blessed with them by a creator. She also says that if they were blessed with powers then they would be making the blind see and the lepers walk." Sheldon explained.

"That's smart." Leonard said.

"No it's not. Who'd want to read a comic book about Spiderman making an old woman see again?" Sheldon said skeptically.

"No one?" Leonard asked weakly.

"Wrong. My mother." Sheldon corrected him.

It was silent, except for Leonard beginning to shape the sand into a castle.

"Do you have to go to church Leonard?"

"I'm Jewish."

"So you go to a Synagogue?"

"Actually no. My mother doesn't spend much time with me." Leonard confessed, finishing off his castle.

"Does your mother make you pray before meals and wash your mouth out with soap whenever you say 'Oh my God'?" Sheldon asked.

"No."

"Then you're doing ok." Sheldon stood up, dusting the sand off his shorts as Leonard finished off his perfectly proportionate castle.

"What's that?" Sheldon pointed at the sand.

"It's a castle." Leonard said, confused.

"No it isn't. A castle is a large private property. There's nothing to stop someone just walking in, so it's not a castle." Sheldon explained.

"But... I spent so long on the measuremts." Leonard said, crestfallen.

Ther was a long silence.

"Congratulations on your pile of sand." Sheldon said, before walking off leaving Leonard to stare at what he now deemed a huge waste of time.

* * *

><p><strong>So, why is Leonard having a vision of him and Sheldon as children? How is he coping with Sheldon's death? The funeral will be soon - tell me whether you'd like him to be very emotional, you know, big scene or something or quite emotional or very detatched and unable to show his true feelings.<strong>

**Mrs DW 11 xx**


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry it's been so long, I've tried to make this update a long one (and failed probably) but I've been working on it for a couple of days. Next chapters the funeral in which a very horrible thing happens (well, several horrible things but one worst of all). anyway, comment on the the chapter or what you think the horrible funeral things will be, criticise or praise my writing, just remember that the more reviews i get the quicker i update! :)**

**Mrs Doctor Who 11 xx**

* * *

><p>The door opened and Leonard jumped.<p>

He had been sat on the couch, staring into space.

Howard walked in carrying a few boxes of pizza, Raj followed holding a stack of games and Penny shut the door behind her, carrying a few bottles of beer.

"What the hell are you doing?" Leonard stood up indignantly.

"It's Halo night." Raj said simply.

"No, it's Wednesday night." Leonard retorted.

"Exactly. It's 8 o clock on Wednesday night, and we always play Halo at 8 o clock on Wednesday night." Howard said, setting the pizzas on the coffe table, nervously shifting greasy food wrappers that had sat there for a week or so out of the way in the process.

"No-" Leonard snatched the TV remote from Raj, who had been about to turn on the TV."We used to play Halo at 8 o clock on Wednesday night. Then our best friend died and guess what, we swapped pizza and stupid games for mourning!"

"Leonard, we get that you miss Sheldon, and we miss him too, but he wouldn't want us to be sad! I know we aren't going to get over it right away but I'm sure we're allowed a little happiness in our lives." Penny said.

"Don't you DARE tell me what he would have wanted! You know what he would have wanted Penny? To win a Nobel Prize! To discover Time-Travel! To hopefully live more than thirty odd years!" Leonard yelled.

Raj looked extremely nervous and Howard, uncomfortable.

"Leonard, we were just trying to cheer you up. You deserve a break from all this!" Howard smiled sympathetically.

"I'm not a child! I can decide whether I can handle the grieving process on my own thanks!" Leonard snapped.

"Leonard, this isn't just about you! We're having a hard time dealing with Sheldon's death and we wanted to go through this surrounded by our friends!" Howard protested.

"What do you care that he's dead, you were never nice to him anyway!" Leonard yelled, regretting it immediately.

Howard took a step back in shock and Raj gasped.

"Wow." Howard said in disbelief.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean-" Leonard began to apologise.

"Yes, you did." Howard said with quiet anger in his voice.

Grabbing one of the boxes of pizza, he walked out, followed closely by Raj who was shooting shocked glances at Leonard.

Penny stood by the door, and it was only then Leonard noticed that she had tears in her eyes.

"You can be a real jerk sometimes, you know that? You act as if you're the only one going through this, but you're not! We all loved Sheldon, even though sometimes we didn't act like it. And the way you won't let any of us into your life anymore... it hurts Leonard!" Penny was blinking hard, fighting back the tears.

"You don't know what it's like! You spent time with him, but he was in almost every waking moment of my life, and now he's just gone!" he protested feebly.

"Don't you think we know that?" she was getting hysterical now. "In fact, out of all of us, I'd say you got the best deal! At least you got to say goodbye! Properly! We had to say it in the hospital, when he was just an existence and not a person! You got to say it in the ambulance, when he at least was breathing on his own! How do you think it feels Leonard, to know that the last thing you said to him was probably 'Hang in there buddy' or 'You can do this' and the last thing any of us said to him was something sarcastic or snarky? At least you have some sort of closure, because I will spend the rest of my life knowing that the last thing I said to one of my best friends was 'You're not optimized for life are you?' That's right, I told a guy, ON THE DAY HE DIED that he wasn't programmed for life! Sure, it was a joke, and it wouldn't have hurt his feelings, but because of that I will never be able to tell anyone the story of the last time I spoke to Sheldon, because it won't help, it will hurt! And as if that wasn't bad enough, you, one of the few people I thought would be sympathetic towards me, just pushes me out the door as soon as I so much as ask you how you're doing! Leonard, there's a reason I need YOU right now, but if you carry on the way you are... I don't think I'm ever going to be able to tell you."

She turned on her heel and left, leaving the door open but slamming her own shut behind her, leaving Leonard to stare at 4B and wonder where this wall had sprung up from, why he had spent so long alone, why he was pushing his friends out.

It was then that he realised why he was doing this, pushing people away and feeling uncomfortable sharing his emotions with them.

It was what Sheldon would have done.

* * *

><p>Leonard ran straight to the bus.<p>

He clambered up eagerly.

He had been waiting for this day all year.

May the fourth.

Star Wars day.

To humour him, his father had agreed to let him wear his Han Solo costume that he had got for his birthday (last year, he might add) to school on May the fourth.

Leonard had half hoped his mother would protest, or smile, or do something to show him she even cared a little what he got up to.

Instead, she looked at him coolly and said nothing.

"Is it OK if I wear my costume to school then, momm- mother?" Leonard asked nervously, remembering how her lips would purse exasperatedly whenever he called her mommy.

"Why should I care what you wear to school? I'm not the one wearing it, so why should it concern me?"

Leonard's face fell, and he slunk from the room.

He flopped onto his bed and picked up the picture he'd cut from a magazine at school.

His teacher had yelled at him for five minutes straight, something about defacing school property, but it had been worth it.

It was of a mom, with pretty blonde curly hair, and she was hugging a little boy about Leonard's age.

Both of them had big grins, and though the little boy had quite wiggly teeth, and his glasses made his eyes all big, it looked like the mom loved him all the same.

Sometimes, when he was feeling especially lonely, Leonard looked at the picture and pretended she was his mom and he was the little boy.

He imagined this now and that his dad had just told him he could wear his Han Solo outfit to school.

At first she fussed, saying she didn't want him to get it dirty and she knew he'd be upset if he fell over and ripped it.

Eventually she came around though, and she ruffled his hair and planted a kiss on his head and told him to be safe and make sure he was especially careful at school, and that if he was, they could go out for ice cream afterwards and when they got home maybe watch Star Wars.

This mom, of course, liked Star Wars.

Leonard jumped onto the bus and strolled proudly down the aisle.

He was so happy, he didn't notice the sniggers that followed him, and even when one of the boys in his class blew a spitball at him he didn't realise.

There was no one to sit with because Sheldon made his mom drive him to school - every time she mentioned the bus, he threw a huge tantrum and printed a sheet off the internet about germs on public transport and followed her around reading it to her until she told him she wouldn't mention it anymore.

Suddenly, he found his way blocked by several older boys from the class above.

"What you wearing there, LeoNERD?" one asked, giving a tug on his waistcoat.

"It-it's my Han Solo costume." Leonard tried to be confident, but his voice shook.

The kids laughed and the biggest grinned nastily.

"Is that from Star Trek or something?" he guffawed.

"Star _Wars_." Leonard mumbled.

"Yeah, whatever. You better hand over your lunch money before I wedgie you into the next dimension, LeoNERD!" the boy held out his hand.

Leonard gulped, but stood his ground.

_What would Han Solo do?_ he thought.

"Look, let's get one thing straight. I take orders from just one person: me." his voice trembled but he felt triumphant.

Leonard hobbled into the playground, his pockets empty, his stomach rumbling and his spirits lowered.

He joined Sheldon in a corner of the yard.

"Hey." he said glumly.

"Is that a Han Solo costume?" Sheldon looked at him in awe.

"Er, yep." Leonard had practically forgot he was wearing it, thanks to those stupid bullies.

"That reminds me; May the Fourth be with you." Sheldon said, and Leonard, cheered up considerably by Sheldon's enthusiasm, grinned and said it back.

"Leonard, I can't help but notice you seem to be limping. I assume you've been wedgied?" Sheldon asked as they began to walk across the playground.

"Yeah." Leonard grimaced.

"Anything you did in particular or was it for their entertainment?" Sheldon questioned the bullies' motives.

"I did something stupid." Leonard admitted.

Sheldon looked at him for a few seconds.

"I'm sorry, is this one of those situations in which I'm meant to guess what happened?" Sheldon asked.

"No... I may as well tell you. When they told me to hand over my lunch money, I... I said... I said 'Look, let's get one thing straight. I take orders from just one person: me.'" Leonard admitted glumly.

"Leonard?"

"Yep."

"You will go down in history as the hero who did two great things. Stood up to bullies and quoted Han Solo - _at the same time."_

* * *

><p>There was a knock at the door.<p>

For a moment Leonard considered not answering.

Let them knock.

Let them bash on that door until their hands were red raw and the wood was splintering.

Let them shout all day for him to let them in.

Let them tell him he needed their help, that he was too weak to do this on his own.

Let him just sit there, and keep in check the last thing he seemed to have control of anymore.

Despite all this, he opened the door in the end.

There was no point kidding himself that he had control over anything now.

He opened the door to Sheldon's mother.

He took a step back out of shock more than anything.

A thought flickered across his mind; she had been meant to arrive the day they turned the life support off, but hadn't turned up for some reason.

"I'm sorry I'm late, I didn't want to drive and between tryin' to work that darn computer to find out train times and seein' what day I could get here for, and then when I arrived I couldn't work out whether you'd be here or at one of your friends' places, and I'd left your number at home so I couldn't call; I supposed since this was Shelly's apartment you and Shelly's other friends would be here, s- oh sweetheart, come here!" she pulled Leonard into a hug as he began to sob.

She stroked his head and shushed him sympathetically as he cried onto her shoulder.

He had always felt that Sheldon's mother was the osrt of mother he wished he'd had as a kid.

Sure she was fiercely religious and her beliefs about science and evolution could be quite irrational, but she was loving and caring and, unlike his own mother, she could make almost everything better with one of her hugs.

He stood in the doorway and, for the first time since he was a child, pretended that the woman who had her arms around him was his mother.

* * *

><p>A plate of steaming cobbler and a glass of soda were placed in front of Leonard.<p>

Picking up a fork, he transferred a piece to his mouth and chewed, marvelling at how good home-cooking tasted after a week or so of crappy take-aways.

He hadn't been able to face phoning any of the take-outs they usually ordered from (their choice of food was based highly around Sheldon's tastes) and so he'd been left with several tiny shops that delivered what could only be described as what looked like dog food swimming in vomit.

He smiled weakly at Mrs Cooper.

"It's delicious, Mrs Cooper. Thanks."

"You're welcome, sweetie. It's the least I can do, considerin' how you've looked after my Shelly all these years."

Leonard held up the glass of soda.

"Got anything stronger?" he joked.

"The last thing you need is alcohol, mister. Besides, the few things that were in the fridge I had to throw out for hygiene purposes - unless of course, you like moss-covered ham?"

Leonard laughed and continued to eat his cobbler.

He looked around.

Though she'd only been here a couple of hours, the apartment was glistening.

This morning it had resembled a squat but she had cleaned and tidied until it was spick and span.

The pile of dirty dishes that had sat in the sink, crusted with food, were now dripping on the draining board.

The wrappers that had covered the coffee table to the extent that he'd often walk into it, unable to see it, had been cleared and the greasy fingerprints all over the surface had somehow been wiped away.

The floors had been swept, vacuumed and mopped and were back to their original colour rather than the faded greys and browns they had become.

Despite all the spring cleaning, she'd also managed to run down to the grocery store.

In fifteen minutes she'd shopped for two weeks worth of food, charmed her way to the front of a queue snaking practically all the way through the store, walked up the stairs and unpacked all the groceries.

As she joined him on the couch with her own plate of cobbler, he let out a whistle of admiration.

"How do you do it? I mean, I've pushed everyone away, lived in a rubbish dump for the past week or so and I haven't so much as _seen_ a vegetable for days. Then you come in and within an hour or so it's a perfectly normal appartment again and you somehow cheer me up even though you should be feeling even more pathetic than I am!" he said.

"Sweetheart, if there's one thing I've learned in all my years as a wife, mother and Catholic it's that the joy of others is the only thing you need to keep you going!" she smiled and took a bite of cobbler.

"Didn't you once glue all your husbands shoes to the floor because you were bored?" Leonard asked.

"That was a good Saturday!" she shook her head, smiling into her bowl.

"What I don't understand is, where are all your little friend's? That lovely Indian boy and Penny and err... who's the one who wears those tight trousers?" she asked.

"Howard. And, well, I haven't been speaking to them lately." Leonard confessed.

"Well, why on earth not? In dark times, your friends get you through. Just like Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. You know, without the fallin' asleep thing."

"It's nothing, just... they wanted us to do Halo night, like we usually do but I said they were out of order for even considering having a games night this soon after Sheldon's death."

"Honey... do you think that because Shleldon's dead it would be wrong for you to have fun?"

"Not exactly, it's just..." he sighed and leaned back against the couch, running a hand through his hair. "It seems like we're not bothered enough by his death. It's like I feel guilty about it; even before when we were only laughing a little I felt as though I should be upset about Sheldon rather than being happy."

"Why do you feel guilty sweetie? What happened was just something that goes on all over the world; sure it could have been avoided, but it was someone else who could have stopped it, not you. Anyway, I'm gonna run you a shower 'coz right now I'm thinkin' I've smelled skunk corpses that have rotted for a month that have a better scent than you. All you have to remember is that... it's not your fault." she smiled and walked into the bathroom and he could hear her fiddling with the shower.

He thought about what she had just said.

He meant to shout his next words but for some reason they came out as little more than a whisper: "But it is my fault."


	4. Chapter 4

**Sorry it's so late, I don't even have an excuse! I know I'm terrible, but please review, I hope you stayed loyal even though I went for a bit! :)**

* * *

><p>Carpe Diem.<p>

Seize the day.

Leonard certainly doesn't feel like seizing the day, as he sits between Sheldon's tearful mother and a sobbing Penny.

She is clinging onto his shoulder, drowning in her despair, but how can he be her lifeboat when he too is lost at sea?

Sheldon's mother is struggling to hold it together, but trying her best as her daughter, Sheldon's twin sister, clutches at her, holding on like a baby monkey as she cries.

Sheldon's older brother, who is burly and tall but has a moronic expression that reminds Penny of one of her ex-boyfriend's, sits beside his sister, stony-faced and silent.

After a week of crying, Leonard is dry-eyed and numb.

He isn't all cried out yet; far from it.

He is simply in the calm at the Eye of the Storm; the worst is yet to come.

Although he felt bad for thinking it, he had assumed the church would be quite empty, that only the few friends and family Sheldon had would have turned up.

However, the majority of the university had came, no doubt having second-thoughts about how they had treated Sheldon now he was being lowered into the ground.

Also, in his will, Sheldon had stated that all of his comrades from World Of Warcraft be invited to his funeral in the unlikely event of his untimely death, so a lot of the people attending the funeral Leonard only knew by their screen names.

Sheldon's mother had tried to persuade Leonard to say a few words, but he had turned her down as politely as he could.

He used the excuse that he wouldn't be able to say all he wanted to about Sheldon in an hour, let alone five minutes.

The real reason, however, is that Leonard felt he wouldn't have enough to say.

Because, with a man so great he had gone to college at age 11, a man so great his daily musings were probably worth thousands of dollars, a man so great that the person he got along best with was himself... could anyone really know him at all?

* * *

><p>Children are cruel.<p>

Leonard and Sheldon had known that since their first day at kindergarten.

However, when Barney Gumbin started school, they were introduced to a new world of cruelty.

The first day Barney arrived at their new school, the teacher taking the register had read out his full name.

"Barnabus Gumbin?" she called, raising her eyebrow ever so slightly.

Several children giggled and Barney turned bright red.

"It's Barney." he said through gritted teeth, and since that moment he had been desperate to prove that he would be the one to do the name-calling around here, and not the other way around.

"Hey, Smelly Pooper!" Barney hissed, shooting a spit-ball at Sheldons head.

Leonard snuck a glance out of the corner of his eye, wanting to defend his friend but terrified of being made fun of when he wasn't currently the subject of conversation.

"What, Barney?" Sheldon asked, perfectly calm.

"Let me see your math homework."

"And why would I do that?"

"So I can copy it of course."

"That's absurd! Why would I let you copy my math homework when social protocol states you would have to do something in return to help me?"

"I will give you something."

"Really?" Sheldon sounds unsure.

"Sure." Barney grins lazily.

"Oh... well, I guess it's ok then." Sheldon passes back his homework and Barney shakes his head in disbelief, scrawling down the sums hastily.

Later, Sheldon and Leonard are walking down the corridor when Barney catches up to them.

"Hey, Sheldon!" he calls, and Leonard is shocked: it's the first time Barney ever called Sheldon by his actual name. "I still didn't give you anything in exchange for your homework!"

"Oh, right." Sheldon replies blankly.

"Here you go. I got you a Hertz doughnut." Barney says amiably.

Sheldon holds out his hand, and before Leonard can warn him, Barney punches him as hard as he can in the stomach, making Sheldon double over in pain and make a sound like a squashed mouse.

"Hurts, don't it?" he roars with laughter and strolls off, leaving Leonard to help Sheldon hobble along, clutching his stomach, until they get to the bathroom.

AS they reach the toilet, Sheldon rushes into a cubicle and Leonard can hear him throwing up.

"Sorry." he calls, grimacing as his friend vomits again.

"What are you... sorry for?" Sheldon gasps, cut off mid-sentence as he heaves.

"I should have stood up for you in class. When he borrowed your homework."

Sheldon finally leaves the cubicle, his face drained of colour as he goes to scrub incessantly at his hands, mouth and face.

"Leonard, I can make my own decisions. Ultimately, we're going to be pushed around our whole lives, so why act as though we won't? If you'd stuck up for me, all that would have happened is that we'd both have got punched in the stomach. Anyway, I believe..." Sheldon scrubs furiously at his red raw hands. "That, 'the rich nerds always get the hot girls'."

Leonard bursts out laughing as Sheldon looks at him, confused, obviously not understanding what he has just said.

"I sure hope so, 'cause don't get me wrong, you're a great friend, but your obsession with clean stuff and always having everything to a schedule would drive me crazy. We better get hot girls, 'cause I'm sure as hell not living with you when I'm older! Leonard jokes, and both boys grin.

* * *

><p>They are lowering Sheldon into the ground.<p>

Almost everyone is crying, Raj sobbing on Howard's shoulder as Howard looks a little uncomfortable but understanding.

Not Leonard.

Not one tear.

But suddenly, it is too much.

"No! No!" he screams and drops down into the grave as people stare and try to grab him.

He throws himself at the coffin, crying and hugging it, giving his best friend the embrace he was never allowed to when he was alive.

Howard and Raj attempt to haul him up but he clings on tightly, and it is only Sheldon's brother (who is, by now, a little puffy-eyed and sniffy) that manages to pull him off the grave and back onto solid ground.

"NO! SHELDON, PLEASE, I'M SORRY!" he is weaker now, so Howard and Raj are able to pull him away from the service, away from this horror. "It should have been me! I wish it were me!"

He is bundled into a car and Howard drives while Raj sits with Leonard in the back, trying to comfort him, but Leonard is beyond listening. He feels like the world is fuzzy and nothing around is clear. It hurts his chest when he fights it, so he just lets himself be carried by the sound of the car engine, the burble of Raj's voice and the feeling of the car wheels turning beneath him.

* * *

><p>It's the wake. Leonard sits on the sofa, still in the same stupor state as he was in the car. He hasn't moved for an hour or two. Countless people have sat and talked, more at him than to him, but eventually they all give up and leave him alone. Penny is the last to come over and sit with him. He hears her clearest, but still the most that gets through of what she's saying is a few words.<p>

'Sheldon' and 'heart' and 'pain' and 'love' and 'together' and 'need'. She stares at him for a minute, then breaks down totally. Her crying is so miserable, it makes the hearts of those around ache as her shoulders shake and she gasps for breath that doesn't seem to come. Bernadette rushes over to console her and decides it is best if Penny leaves, guiding her back to her apartment.

But later, Penny's back, putting on a brave face and smiling over memories of Sheldon with the other guests.

Leonard's head snaps up as the door slams open.

Stood in the doorframe, grinning and wearing a Hawaian shirt and a lei is Amy Farrah Fowler.

"Hey guys!" she smiles, dropping her suitcase. "Did you miss me? I just got back!" at their stunned faces, she elaborates. "Y'know, from Hawiai? Where's Sheldon, I want to show him some interesting samples I took of DNA from the locals!"

There is a sound, an awful sound, worse than Leonard's despair, or Raj's crying, or even Penny's sobbing.

It is the sound of Sheldon's mother crying so hard she struggles to stand. She sinks to the floor.

"He's gone, my Shelly! My baby boy, my youngest! He's gone, forever!" she rocks herself, her gaze shifting to Amy, and she smiles faintly, a bittersweet smile. "And you... you're his Amy! He loved you. He didn't know it, but I did. No one ever thought he could feel it, least of all him, but I knew, when he talked about you... oh Amy... he was gonna marry you."


End file.
